“’We are Not Part of Them’: Dissension, Colonialism, and African Politics in Colonial Ghana”

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In the early 1820s, Denkyera, a West African Polity that rose to economic and political dominance in the seventeenth-century Gold Coast, migrated southwest from the interior parts of the Gold Coast (now Ghana) to the coastal areas of the territory. The spatial dislocation of Denkyera from the interior disconnected the people of Denkyera from their symbolic, ancestral, and spiritual home, Abankesieso. At Jukwa, about ten miles away from Cape Coast, however, the people of Denkyera began a process of (re)building the old state in a new environment, and subsequently became actively involved in the dynamics of political affairs of the Gold Coast, especially in the relations between Asante, the southern Fante states, and the British. From the late nineteenth century, however, Denkyera’s attempt to reinvent the state in a new environment coincided with the British colonization of the Southern parts of the Gold Coast (which now included Denkyera). This paper examines the complexities of state (re)making, local politics, and colonialism in colonial Denkyera. It analyzes how the people of Denkyera, following their initial dislocation from their spiritual and ancestral home, attempted to rebuild the ancient state in a new environment while jostling with European colonization at the same time. Particularly, it focuses on how commoners and elites of Denkyera deployed old stories of the state to reinvent Denkyera in a new environment. I argue that an understanding of the precolonial politics of Denkyera is key to understanding the often dynamic but complex political contestations in colonial Denkyera. In making this argument, I wish to highlight a broader proposition. I use the complexities of Denkyera local politics to highlight how local African problems still remained relevant during the colonial period.

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Co-hosted with: Program in African Studies, Africa World Initiative (OWNER)

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